Awards

The Pulitzer Prize is for writing and photography. I can't think of an award for copy editing. And the Pulitzer doesn't give out design awards. Despite its hardcore connection to journalism, neither does the Society of Professional Journalists Annual Awards. I'm not sure if SPJ thinks designers are real journalists.

Are designers real journalists? Yes. (But we all know that soon they won’t be. Soon all designers will be cyborgs created by Gannett to randomly fill space on the front page (on every page) of every paper. Every journalism competition that doesn’t have a category for designers is only making it easier for Gannett to go through with their robo-designers plan.)

For now, though, anyone who works at a newspaper (at, not for) is a real journalist (ad salesmen don't count — they work for a newspaper). Easier definition: anyone who considers a newsroom their second home is a real journalist, whether they currently work in one or not. It's a bit weird to think about designers as journalists, because when people decry the mass media, they are almost always talking about the reporters. Never the copy editors, never the designers. I'm not sure if citizens even know those jobs exist. Well, they do.

Back to my point. Awards. Newspaper design is important enough to warrant its own awards, though they aren't as high caliber as the Pulitzer or as well-known as the SPJ awards. Here's a list of some of the competitions, so you, too, can try to become Sports Designer of the Year.

Society of News Design
Sports Designer
Michigan State University